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The Roots of Canadian Law in Canada

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The Roots of Canadian Law in Canada The Roots of Canadian Law in Canada John Ralston Saul* This article asks the Canadian legal community to Cet article demande à la communauté juridique look beyond the standard historical viewpoint that roots canadienne d’aller au-delà du point de vue historique Canadian law in the British common law and French standard selon lequel les racines du droit canadien se civil law traditions. The author discusses the historical trouvent dans les traditions de common law britannique foundations of Canadian law in a uniquely Canadian et de droit civil français. L’auteur retrace les context, beginning with the earliest interactions fondements historiques du droit canadien dans le between the First Nations and the Europeans. Drawing contexte unique du pays, en commençant par les on the research outlined in his recent book, A Fair premières interactions entre les Premières Nations et les Country, the author challenges his audience to think of Européens. En s’appuyant sur les recherches étayées Canadian law as far more than the local implementation dans son récent livre Mon pays métis, l’auteur enjoint le of foreign legal traditions. While Canada has freely public à envisager le droit canadien comme beaucoup borrowed from various legal traditions, the application plus que la simple implantation locale de traditions of law in Canada has been a unique process intimately juridiques étrangères. Bien que le Canada ait emprunté tied to Canadian history. The author calls on us to librement à diverses traditions juridiques, l’application recognize a distinctly Canadian legal tradition which du droit au Canada a toujours été un processus unique has grown out of Aboriginal law and subsequent local intimement lié à l’histoire canadienne. L’auteur nous experience while being influenced by, but by no means interpelle pour que nous reconnaissions une tradition limited to, common law and civil law traditions. juridique canadienne distincte, issue du droit autochtone et de l’expérience locale subséquente, tout en étant influencée par les traditions de common law et de droit civil sans y être limitée. * Essayist and novelist, Companion of the Order of Canada, Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, President of International PEN, co-Chair of the Institute for Canadian Citizenship. This text is a revised version of an address given at the McGill Faculty of Law on 3 February 2009 on the occasion of the McGill Law Journal Annual Lecture. © John Ralston Saul 2009 To be cited as: (2009) 54 McGill L.J. 671 Mode de référence : (2009) 54 R.D. McGill 671 672 MCGILL LAW JOURNAL / REVUE DE DROIT DE MCGILL [Vol. 54 I would like to begin the written form of this lecture by acknowledging the Mohawk people on whose traditional land we are. This form of acknowledgement is commonly and correctly used in Western Canada. I have noticed that it is very slowly coming into use in southern Ontario and Quebec, yet I cannot think of places where it could be more important to make this a norm. Some of you, as law students, professors and judges, may feel that this is a mere formality. But if you consider various Supreme Court of Canada decisions over the last few decades, you quickly realize that there are different forms of belonging—forms outside of those European norms of ownership defined by buying and selling. These non-European ideas of the relationship between land and people have been recognized by our courts. They will play an increasingly important role in the complex way we understand what this land is and what form our relationships to it will take. Madame la rédactrice en chef, je vous remercie pour votre invitation. Je suis très heureux d’être ici aujourd’hui, étant à ma façon un produit et un membre de l’Université McGill, qui m’a décerné un doctorat honorifique en lettres. Toutefois, comme je ne suis pas avocat, je vous prierais d’être indulgent si je me trompe dans certains énoncés de cet exposé. En vérité, je suis un produit par deux fois de McGill, puisque j’ai aussi passé quatre années ici, de manière plus honnête, c’est-à-dire que j’y ai étudié pour décrocher mon diplôme. J’ai fréquenté l’Université dans les années 1966-69, à une époque où McGill était un lieu particulièrement excitant, car nous étions en grève la plupart du temps. Je conserve des souvenirs très animés de cette période, notamment d’avoir rencontré Frank R. Scott1, qui était l’un des grands hommes de cette Faculté. Un soir, des étudiants ont décidé de mener une action provocatrice inédite et d’occuper le bureau du Président. J’étais moi-même devant le bureau, où plusieurs de mes collègues étaient déjà assis par terre, lorsque j’ai soudainement regardé à ma droite et vu un homme beaucoup plus grand et imposant à mes côtés. Il portait un costume ancien et distingué et dégageait une grande sagesse et certitude, tout en laissant deviner le mépris d’un homme de gauche qui regarde des jeunes de gauche essayant de bousculer l’ordre établi. Il fumait longuement une cigarette et j’essayais de trouver une manière intelligente d’aborder cet être impressionnant qu’était Frank R. Scott. Je me suis tourné vers lui et ai prononcé, avec un maximum de dignité, «Good evening, sir». Sa cigarette à la bouche, il a lentement aspiré une énorme bouffée et l’a envoyée en l’air avec un calme stoïque, puis s’est retourné vers moi. Il m’a considéré du haut de sa présence imposante, puis encore plus lentement, m’a 1 Homme de lettres et d’engagement social, doyen de la Faculté de droit de l’Université McGill de 1961 à 1964. Frank R. Scott a notamment remporté les célèbres causes Switzman v. Elbling ([1957] R.C.S. 285, 7 D.L.R. (2e) 337), qui a reconnu l’inconstitutionnalité de la Loi protégeant la province contre la propagande communiste (S.R.Q. 1941, c. 52), ainsi que Roncarelli v. Duplessis ([1959] R.C.S. 121, 16 D.L.R. (2e) 689), qui a jeté les bases de la primauté du droit en droit public canadien. 2009] J. R. SAUL – THE ROOTS OF CANADIAN LAW IN CANADA 673 répondu : «Hi». Ses yeux ont ensuite glissé vers la porte du bureau, et ce fut tout. Je suis parti, ayant compris que j’étais un étudiant et qu’il était un grand homme. J’ai plus tard eu l’opportunité d’être invité à quelques reprises à prononcer des conférences devant des auditoires de juristes, notamment devant l’Association du Barreau canadien. Le juge en chef de la Cour suprême du Canada de l’époque, le très honorable Antonio Lamer, était assis juste à côté de moi. La conférence avait lieu dans une grande salle à l’acoustique un peu déficiente. Si mes souvenirs sont exacts, j’ai soutenu une série d’affirmations assez originales, donc assez risquées devant un parterre de juristes chevronnés. À chacune de ces affirmations controversées, je regardais le juge en chef pour évaluer sa réaction. Bien que révolutionnaire sur papier, c’était un homme qui ressemblait davantage à un gentleman d’une vieille école du dix-neuvième siècle. Il me regardait avec beaucoup plus de gentillesse que Frank R. Scott et chaque fois que je lançais l’un de mes propos risqués, il hochait la tête avec un sourire, en signe d’un parfait accord. Après la conférence, je l’ai remercié d’avoir manifesté son approbation envers mes propos. Il m’a répondu : «Cette salle est impossible. Je n’entendais absolument rien de ce que vous disiez». Je suis heureux de parler aujourd’hui dans une faculté en avance sur beaucoup d’autres facultés de droit au Canada et ailleurs dans le monde, une faculté qui enseigne le droit civil et la common law ensemble, pas simplement en parallèle. La Faculté offre en plus un cours spécial intitulé «Aboriginal Peoples and the Law»2. Est-ce à dire qu’il existe un principe de droit autour duquel étudier les questions autochtones ? Je crois que les peuples autochtones n’approuveraient pas une telle interprétation du mot «droit». En lisant le syllabus du cours, j’ai retenu le passage suivant : «What does it mean to acknowledge the coexistence of Aboriginal legal traditions and European legal traditions in Canada?». Cette phrase touche le nœud de mon exposé, car à première vue elle laisse entendre une coexistence de systèmes juridiques qui n’ont jamais eu d’influence l’un sur l’autre. Évidemment, les systèmes juridiques de droit autochtone, de droit civil et de common law existent séparément et simultanément au Canada. Or, il se trouve également des relations intimes entre ces systèmes, même si peu de gens, par exemple, se penchent sur les liens étroits entre la philosophie du droit autochtone et le droit civil ou la common law. L’ancienne chef de la Commission des revendications des Indiens, l’avocate Renée Dupuis, mentionne d’ailleurs que beaucoup s’en tiennent aux racines de la colonisation dans la manière de définir leurs origines, y compris dans le domaine juridique. En cherchant la vérité à travers les notes de bas de page et les précédents, l’origine des choses se retrouve toujours quelque part en Angleterre ou en France. Cela peut sembler logique d’un point de vue historique, mais il est alors impossible d’éviter une perspective et un état d’esprit colonial. Pour 2 Kirsten Jane Anker, Coursepack: Aboriginal Peoples and the Law, Faculté de droit, Université McGill, 2008. 674 MCGILL LAW JOURNAL / REVUE DE DROIT DE MCGILL [Vol. 54 Renée Dupuis, au contraire, le droit coutumier autochtone s’insère dans le droit canadien, explicitement ou non3.
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